I don't understand the arguments in this thread - I post a couple of times that "actually, it's a minimal DPS loss, never mind - we're still competitive" and nobody takes a blind bit of notice. People continue to argue top-ranking parses, BiS sims and post that the sky is falling because we've lost 1/3 of UM's strength bonus. Seriously?

Originally Posted by Skarssen

You seem to not understand what meter padding means. Spreading diseases to bats when your strategy doesn't kill them is meter padding. Spreading diseases to the dogs on phase 3 of Qon IS NOT meter padding.

^^ At least someone gets it. These comments about "scumbagging DPS" when you're actually just playing to unholy's strengths and spreading diseases to adds that, under normal circumstances you kill anyway is NOT cheesing meters. Diseasing a spare head on Megeara? Cheesing. Diseasing bats on Tortos if your raid group don't actually kill them? Cheesing (unless you're chillblaining or w/e) but the fact of the matter is Unholy isn't competitive this tier just because of the spec, it's competitive because encounter mechanics allow it to be. Spreading strong diseases to adds that go out of (what would be) frost's cleave range (council, for example) or turn invisible/fly away (Twins, Iron Qon) is one of unholy's main strengths and there isn't a "health reset" type protectors fight so all of that is OK.

Originally Posted by prestilence

It isn't unholy anymore, its actually called Festerblight, that is why most DKs would switch to unholy. And you only do that when you have optimal trinkets, then re-gem and reforge all of your gear to have the highest possible festerblight rotation. Along withthat for high end raiding guilds, rogues would focus their ToT on the DK as well. And since the Unholy might 5% nerf, the fact you cant benefit your diseases from ToT anymore makes festerblight the worst of all DK playstyle going into 5.3

Another thing that annoys me. Festerblight, i.e. the practise of getting maximum-powaaah diseases off at the start of the fight and rolling them for the duration IS a new thing. However, under normal circumstances for 90% of DKs that can't just have raid tactics moulded around them, it's not overly realistic to expect to use the "festerblight" playstyle on a lot of encounters. In this instance you're re-applying diseases with outbreak when you have trinket procs etc and keeping to a relatively normal unholy rotation, potentially extending diseases until your next feather proc... This is NOT festerblight, good DKs have been applying buffed diseases since DS.

Additionally, festerblight was still better without tricks and this "reforge/regem for the highest possible festerblight rotation" stuff seems inconsequential seeing as the actual stat priorities were basically the same as traditional unholy.

As it stands, yes this is a nerf to standard unholy... Not just festerblight, but that's OK, go about your lives, all specs are competitive as they have been this entire tier, and last.

At the same time, WoW is a diku MUD, and comparative performance is how we measure our character's progress, and thus it matters to a whole lot of people who are still stuck on normal modes or even doing LFR. Also topping the meters is fun. We want to do our best. So stop telling people that "3% doesn't matter" or whatever. We understand what you're saying but we don't care.

At the same time, WoW is a diku MUD, and comparative performance is how we measure our character's progress, and thus it matters to a whole lot of people who are still stuck on normal modes or even doing LFR. So stop telling people that "3% doesn't matter" or whatever. We understand what you're saying and we don't care.

If you want to be a bold-type douche about it then here's a truth bomb, mechanics favor unholy on the majority of encounters, does that mean other specs are rubbish? No. This recent change isn't altering anything drastically. If you want to carry on like it's your first ever nerf then go ahead

I still expect Festerblight to be competitive with frost, just lower than it was.

Apologies, and I agree that comparative performance is a good measure of how we're progressing vs other classes and specs. If I go from being top dps in our raids to middle-bottom then everything I've said above means sweet-FA.

Festerblight was the strongest spec in the entire game in 5.2. If your raid is comprised of people with similar skill and gear levels, you will drop a bit. But it's a lot more likely you're top DPS because you're a better player and/or outgear them, so that won't change. And of course it takes a lot of fights to minimize the RNG sufficiently to make a 3% performance disparity significant.

Then again, a lot of specs got pretty huge buffs in 5.3. If you have a highly skilled ret paladin, enhance shaman, feral druid, monk, or hunter in your guild who was held back by his spec being weak in 5.2, he's likely to jump ahead quite a lot.

Festerblight was the strongest spec in the entire game in 5.2. If your raid is comprised of people with similar skill and gear levels, you will drop a bit. But it's a lot more likely you're top DPS because you're a better player and/or outgear them, so that won't change. And of course it takes a lot of fights to minimize the RNG sufficiently to make a 3% performance disparity significant.

Then again, a lot of specs got pretty huge buffs in 5.3. If you have a highly skilled ret paladin, enhance shaman, feral druid, monk, or hunter in your guild who was held back by his spec being weak in 5.2, he's likely to jump ahead quite a lot.

Megaera: Previous poster commented, Roiling off the adds onto the extra head as well as blatant PS's/OB's into the Poison Head. Both specs are arguably equal on relevant DPS.

Iron Qon: Jin'rokh again, extend strong diseases for the first two dogs and they continue ticking while the dog is in the air. Another fight where disease extension causes the spec to be better for a specific playstyle.

Traditional Unholy and Frost are essentially equal, with Unholy having a very small edge typically.

Yes, Ive done all of those fights on heroic. But what you describe isn't meter padding like others are suggesting; it just highlights unholy superiority, which is my point. People seem to keep coming up with excuses why any comparison between frost and unholy is invalid, mainly with the intention to convince others that unholy isn't far ahead of frost when it is on every single encounter in the current tier. Doesn't matter what the mechanics are, because there isn't a single fight where frost can compete with unholy. There are no patchwerk fights where "extenuating circumstances" don't exist for you or anyone else to compare unholy and frost in a vaccum. And even if you could, it wouldn't matter because those type of fights don't exist anymore.

And the argument that "traditional" unholy isn't OP is pretty silly too. Why would anyone play traditional (aside from fun) if festerblight is so much better? That is like trying to argue that frost wasn't OP in 4.2/4.3 (I know frost wasn't OP then, just using it as an example) because 2-hand frost stunk, all the while ignoring the fact the DW existed and was far superior.

I haven't done any serious testing yet, but it seems like frost might pull ahead slightly in this patch, however it shouldn't be a substantial lead and player skill is still going to dictate who does the most dps out of dk players. However, as I said, I haven't simmed anything yet so I don't exactly now if I'm right or not but that's just what I think is going too happen based on the patchnotes

thing is with tot raiding is there is not actually any patchwerk type fights. all are about mechanics, people here are talking about small differences in DPS between frost and unholy. I think that unholy is still a strong spec not because it pulls more dps than frost but because of unholy presence, the fact that its close to dps with frost is just a bonus. if you struggle with enrage timers in ToT then I don't think its anything to do with the spec(more to do with your group/skill/gear levels). I won't be abandoning it over a 5% str nerf. I don't get why people rage over which spec is superior or which is harder. both are fun and both have their merits. and unholy really is not more complicated than frost.

I do like how they've given unholy a bit of love in 5.2 since it did kinda feel like frost was the only option and a change in pace is definitely good once in a while, but they wouldn't nerf it if they felt it wasn't needed.

I'm notably annoyed about this change, Unholy deserved the nerf, but there are major outliers sitting above Unholy if you factor in "useful" DPS instead of meter cheesing. Why in god's name our best spec has to be nerfed, no matter how minor, while two major outliers in particular (Fire Mages, and all three Warlock specs) remain relatively untouched is beyond me.

I'm notably annoyed about this change, Unholy deserved the nerf, but there are major outliers sitting above Unholy if you factor in "useful" DPS instead of meter cheesing. Why in god's name our best spec has to be nerfed, no matter how minor, while two major outliers in particular (Fire Mages, and all three Warlock specs) remain relatively untouched is beyond me.